{"id":1300,"date":"2010-04-26T10:05:42","date_gmt":"2010-04-26T16:05:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/?p=1300"},"modified":"2010-04-26T18:21:45","modified_gmt":"2010-04-27T00:21:45","slug":"finding-indoor-light-for-portraits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/2010\/04\/26\/finding-indoor-light-for-portraits\/","title":{"rendered":"Finding Indoor Light for Portraits"},"content":{"rendered":"

When I do an indoor shoot (such as for my newborn sessions), I always wander around the location looking for the best light.\u00c2\u00a0 I know many people aren’t sure what “great light” really means, so I hope this post helps!<\/p>\n

When I do an indoor shoot I always shoot right next to a window or glass door if possible.\u00c2\u00a0 Most photographers love<\/em> huge north-facing windows (one of the first things I learned about photography when I was about 15, thanks mom!).\u00c2\u00a0 North-facing is so great because you never get harsh, direct sunlight.<\/p>\n

The pictures below are all from my own apartment, which has east-facing windows.\u00c2\u00a0 In the morning the sun goes directly into the windows and creates what we call “hot-spots.”\u00c2\u00a0 Hot-spots are terrible<\/em> for taking photographs.\u00c2\u00a0 In this first shot, you can see the the light is slightly diffused by the blinds, but it still creates bright light with many funky shadows.<\/p>\n

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As the day progresses, this hot-spot will move closer and closer to the window\/door until it’s gone.\u00c2\u00a0 This next picture was taken at about 10 am and the bright spots are almost gone!\u00c2\u00a0 You can see that to properly expose for the light, the rest of the room looks very dark.\u00c2\u00a0 Bright light like this creates harsh shadows on faces and causes people to squint.<\/p>\n

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Ah, isn’t this better?\u00c2\u00a0 The blinds are still down, but the light is much softer.\u00c2\u00a0 You can just barely see the shadows the blinds leave on the floor.\u00c2\u00a0 You may also notice that this area is decently sized and uncluttered.\u00c2\u00a0 I often move furniture around to get a big enough space to work with!<\/p>\n

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This is much better!\u00c2\u00a0 The blinds are up, allowing for the most light.\u00c2\u00a0 I also removed the screen outside to bring in more light, which is soft and pretty.\u00c2\u00a0 This is the type of light you’d get from north or south-facing windows all day.\u00c2\u00a0 If the window is east-facing, you’d get this light in the late morning\/afternoon.\u00c2\u00a0 If the window is west-facing you’d get this light in the morning\/early afternoon.<\/p>\n

You can see that there’s still a shadow by the wall at the bottom of the window, which is okay, but I would move my subject out of that shadow and into the light.\u00c2\u00a0 The best light will come from windows\/doors that reach all the way to the floor (I love<\/em> sliding glass doors for this reason), but you can still get good light next to a window that’s higher up as long as raise your subject somehow or move them over out of the shadow.<\/p>\n

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Here are some shots of my hands (I’m jealous right now of people with children; insta-models!).\u00c2\u00a0 This is in harsh light found in the first two pictures.\u00c2\u00a0 The blinds are up and the shadows from the window pane are harsh and dark.\u00c2\u00a0 The light is super bright and the kind that would make a person squint.<\/p>\n

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Doesn’t my hand (and the background!) look so much lovelier?\u00c2\u00a0 This is in the light from the afternoon.\u00c2\u00a0 No harsh shadows, no bright lights, and no squinting :)!<\/p>\n

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And now for a real live (small) person.\u00c2\u00a0 This picture was taken in the exact same spot in the afternoon.<\/p>\n

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Another thing to consider when looking for good light is to look for things outside the window that could possible block a large portion of that good light from making it through, such as a tree or several bushes.\u00c2\u00a0 The best light comes from a window that doesn’t have anything like a porch or other overhang outside of it (though mine does have a balcony right outside, so it’s not awful, just not the best).<\/p>\n

Happy light-hunting!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I do an indoor shoot (such as for my newborn sessions), I always wander around the location looking for the best light.\u00c2\u00a0 I know many people aren’t sure what “great light” really means, so I hope this post helps! When I do an indoor shoot I always shoot right next to a window or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[30],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1300"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1300"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1300\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kellinicolephotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}